Squeeze or Landing Pages?

I was speaking with a client yesterday and I was going over two types of page, the squeeze page and the landing page.  Basically, these are two types of pages which are designed about the same, but have different goals… sort of.  It is all very fuzzy.  This might clear it up:

Squeeze Page: This page type  is designed to get the viewer to respond immediately.   Basically, it takes the view down through a bunch of verbiage designed to convince them that they should contact the website owner.

Landing Page: This page type is designed to convince the viewer that they are in the right place and urge them not to surf away.

Why are these two types important?

Both serve a purpose, both do it different, yet both only have subtle differences.

Lets look at the goals for each page:

Squeeze Page

• Create leads
• Convince a visitor that the product or service being offered is something they want.
• Create conversions for inexpensive or impulse buy products

Landing Page

• Prevent visitor from surfing away
• Get the visitor to view the rest of the site.
• Create a conversion (Sale)

So, given these goals, it is clear that a squeeze page is aimed at visitors who know little about the product or service being offered and the site plans to inform them and then get them to make a snap decision to provide contact information.    The landing page makes the assumption that the visitor is looking for the product or service and has landed on the page from a search engine or other well defined source.   Given that it is  known what the visitor wants, the goal is to convince them that they are in the right place to get it.   There is no need to pressure them to make a snap decision to provide their contact information because if they think they are in the right place, they will start evaluating the product or service offered.    Then if the product offered is what they want, they will either buy it or they will contact the seller, depending on how the product or service is offered.

Knowing the goal and type of the page will help design the content.  Landing pages work well with product pictures, a small amount of language and links to purchase or continue.  Squeeze pages need less distracting pictures and some big text to convince the surfer that they need this product and should contact us for more information.

Squeeze pages also can be used for conversion if the product is something that someone might buy without thinking, such as a book or an informational CD.  The product, how it is purchased and the price are really the deciding factors that determine if a squeeze page should attempt conversion or just lead generation.